This Time Tomorrow
by RaeC
Summary: SLASH: At what point do you realize what is most important in your life? When it is right in front of you, or maybe it is in the moment it's gone?


  
Disclaimer: Yada, yada, yada. All hail 'The Power's That Be'.   
  
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This Time Tomorrow  
by Rae C.  
  
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Fate is neither a kind nor a benevolent mistress. She hands out destinies as carelessly as one would candy at a birthday party. She can be the harbinger of eternal happiness or a harpy that rips apart the fragile bond that connects us to this life.   
  
Her way is to steal into the night, striking in the dark when one least expects. She slips past and you never know that you have been touched or chosen; simply an act to be completed lain at your door. And a horrible truth appears, did she gift you with a burden to be born or curse you to living hell?  
  
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'Fate,' decided Blair Sandburg as he looked up at the darkened windows of the loft, 'is a bitch.'   
  
No truck. No Jim. 'Damn.'  
  
The cold northwesterly winds thundered off the bay repeatedly rocking the old battered Volvo. The frigid current sank into the vehicle steeling what little warmth the tiny heater puffed into the air the moment it arose. Several layers of shirts, a coat, gloves, and scarf still couldn't keep the chill out.   
  
Blair huddled in his car, bouncing and rubbing body parts to keep warm. But he couldn't help cursing the day he ever gave Jim back his keys. What were the odds? The one day he needed to find Jim home and he's out. Any other time Jim would be right here, snug as a bug in a rug.   
  
Fate just had it in for him. Bound and determined to make his life miserable. First she handed him his innermost desire and then took it all away. He wasn't sure what god or gods he had pissed off, but whoever they were, he hoped they were laughing their asses off.   
  
And it all started when his mother came to town. Didn't it? No, it started before that...with Alex Barnes. Just an unfeeling, skulking curse eating away at the fabric of his life; from his relationship with Jim to the fiasco with the dissertation.   
  
If only.   
  
That was a laugh. If only he hadn't died. If only Naomi had kept her hands to herself. If only the damn publisher hadn't leaked his dissertation to the press. If only, if only, if only. How much bad karma can a person rack up anyway?  
  
Blair searched the loft windows yet again. Still dark. It was two am, where in the hell could Jim be?  
  
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To draw a truth out from hiding, you have to be willing to listen to its words; willing listen to the whispers within. And you have to be willing to heed their call. For what's the point of listening if you don't hear? What's the point of listening, if you won't let it in?   
  
What point is there in loving a person, if the person you love is afraid to love you in return?  
  
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'Four hours, whoa...I only have four hours left. Jim, where the hell are you, man?' The frantic thought lashed around in his brain yet again. Not much time before Blair left Cascade. Left the comfort of his first and only real home. Left Jim. That was going to take some getting used to.   
  
Left for a life somewhere that isn't here. A sharp pain twisted, knifing its way into his gullet stealing all thought. Absently he rubbed his hand across his belly, reminding himself to breathe. Just one of many reasons he was leaving Cascade. One of the many, many, many things that had gone wrong and wasn't likely to change anytime soon. All the pain and none of the benefits that went with it. Everything was *off*, out of alignment, left of center.   
  
'Oh yeah, I blew it. Big time. Let everything get out of hand. Left an invitation for disaster displayed in all its glory on the desk for my mother to find. Fate had a hand in that one as well. Why couldn't she just leave well enough alone?'   
  
Blair debated with himself over the wisdom of banging his head on the steering wheel in defeat. Frustration was not a new sensation to the grad student. Four years with Jim had taught him the lesson of patience in spades. Given him a new appreciation for waiting. Sometimes things were worth waiting for, meant more once you got your hands on them. Like cool ice cream slipping down your throat on a really hot day.   
  
+===+===+  
  
Dreams change, they really do. They grow and wander as you get older and change. Something that seemed so important long ago, just doesn't matter anymore. The search for a 'Holy Grail' is only important so long as you are searching for it, not when you've already found it. Then the man becomes more important than the search. What does a piece of paper mean? Nothing. For in everything we love and for in everything that is important, do we *need* to qualify ourselves with paper or will words and deeds suffice?   
  
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'I had Jim.'  
  
That is until Naomi happened. 'Now, she's off processing somewhere and I'm left here holding the bag.' To pick up the pieces. Left to wallow under the fallout of distrust, guilt, and pure spite. It was too much. 'I'm not, like, immortal or anything.'  
  
And I can't tell the truth. Jim can't do his job because of me. I can't do my job because of the 'dissertation'. Frustration levels are so high around Major Crimes right now, that it won't take much to set off a spark.  
  
Two months, two long gruelling months of fighting, torturing both my body and my mind in some insane hope that it would all work out in the end. Some days, it's all I can do to get out of bed, the aches and pains are so bad.   
  
But hey, this is real life. Shit happens, ya know? You deal and move on. But 'they' weren't. Okay so Major Crimes did, but a whole Police Force dead set against the traitorous interloper hadn't. I was the enemy, camped on their doorstep all the while hiding in the horse. And I was being forced down their throat 24/7. And if it was one thing I'd learned about cops, they didn't like to be 'forced' to do anything. 'The neo hippie witch doctor punk', (as Jim so succinctly put it the day we met), the possibility that I'm gay (Okay, so all of that is true), and the fact that I tried to take down one of their own (so not true); all combined together into some primordial sludge in their eyes. Half thought Ellison was being tortured into taking me for a partner and the other half thought that partnering me with Ellison was justice. 'I'd get what was coming to me.'  
  
I had to move out of the apartment to keep some sort of peace; taking up residence with the one friend who hadn't abandoned me from the University, Eli. Crafty Old Man that he is, he took my dissertation and put it in a lock box. Then amazingly enough two days later he handed me a sheet of paper.  
  
"A forward for the day you do publish it, Blair."  
  
"What? It's all a bunch of lies, Eli."  
  
"Blair, you can play the fool with those idiots out there, but I know the truth. So do you. Take it."  
  
"No one will believe it's from you."  
  
"More fool they." Dr. Stoddard cackled. "You and I know the truth."  
  
"I couldn't ask you to risk your reputation that way. It's over. Let it be."  
  
"I don't give two damns what the overstuffed, overly self important lackeys think of me. And neither should you. Take the forward, Blair. It will get your book published."  
  
"But.."  
  
"No buts. My lawyer has a copy and instructions to verify it should I be gone."  
  
Taking the sheet from my shaking hands, he placed the paper into the box that contained my life's work. The reminder of the happiest time of my life and the embodiment of my current living hell.   
  
That box sat on Eli's desk, a constant reminder every day that I've lived here. A reminder of every joy, every heartache, every bridge crossed, every bullet, knife, cut, scrape, puncture, every battlefield and still I couldn't regret a moment. That's when the epiphany came. I'd done all I could and I couldn't do anymore. I didn't have anything to prove, not to Major Crimes, not to Simon, not to the University, not to the Police Force, not to Jim and not to myself. I'd done everything right. I was done punishing myself for my sins. Everyone would believe what they wanted. Time for me to leave. As much as I loved Jim, I couldn't stay. I loved him enough to walk away. To give him back the rest of his life. To give everyone back their lives.   
  
Then Eli came home.  
  
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What is justice? Nothing but a blind maiden beholden to her scales. She cannot see the balance she must maintain, nor the turmoil she causes as her sword falls. What is one life in the grand scheme of things? One heart? One life?   
  
Justice? Justice for whom?  
  
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"So, you're leaving." A flat statement, no question in his voice at all.  
  
"That transparent?"  
  
"Yes, but then I've had years to read you, Blair. I've been expecting it. I'm surprised you lasted this long."  
  
"What do you mean?"  
  
"You wanted so much that you refused to let go. Sometimes that is the only way to win. This time, that hurricane force of will that you blow through a room won't clear the debris."  
  
"Yeah, kinda just figured that out myself." Blair chuckled in spite of himself. "Thanks for everything, Eli. You've really been great throughout all of this."  
  
"It's nothing." Eli sank into his favourite chair sipping a brandy. "Time to start over. Any ideas?"  
  
"None. I can't teach. I can't be a cop. I don't want to leave but it's for the best. Not too many places in this city are willing to take a self proclaimed liar on for hire."  
  
"Maybe not here, Blair. But what about somewhere else?"  
  
"Like where? I can probably hide in some third world country for about ten years. Maybe by then everyone will have forgotten about me."  
  
"Well," Eli nervously studied the young man in front of him.  
  
"Just spit it out. At this point I'm willing to try just about anything."  
  
"I'm going to South America."  
  
"Eli, I don't know. I mean anything I touch is going to be tainted. And the University will never agree."  
  
"Yes, I know. That's why I didn't tell them."  
  
"What?!" Blair was alternately outraged and amazed. "Just what is going on here?"  
  
"I told them I had a guide that would be meeting the group in Argentina and we would head for the jungles from there."  
  
"Eli, I appreciate the offer and all..."  
  
"Blair, just say 'yes'. You need time to 'process' as you call it. I'm giving you that time. And you'll be getting paid for it. Go say your good-byes and I'll meet you here at say six?"  
  
"Eli..."  
  
"Just say yes," he warned. "What do you have a better offer?"  
  
"All right, all right. Yes, I'll go. Okay? Satisfied now?"  
  
"Yes." Eli purred.  
  
And they both burst into laughter. It was the first time Blair had truly laughed in months and Eli drank in the musical sound. He vowed to hear its rich tones often in the coming months. Blair might be outcast by most everyone in Cascade, but he would always hold a place in his heart. Perhaps it was time to tell the lad?  
  
"Blair?"  
  
"Yes?"  
  
"I..."  
  
Fixing blue eyes on his mentor, Blair awaited whatever pronouncement was coming forth. It was not often that Eli Stoddard was lost for words.  
  
"What is it?" Blair was starting to get concerned.  
  
"Well," Eli coughed 'and' blushed. "Just...You've been a pleasure to know."  
  
Startled, Blair was left floundering, not much to say himself at the uncommonly offered praise. "Um.."  
  
"No, don't say anything. Go on, get. Do whatever it is you young people do before you head off to the jungle. Don't be late."  
  
The gruff command was softened by a pat against his hand.  
  
"Yes, Master." Blair imitating a hunchback shuffled out the door.  
  
"And don't you forget it!" Eli laughed as Blair grabbed his keys and jacket.   
  
"Six a.m." drifted after Blair as he shut the door.   
  
  
Which left him here, hunched over his steering wheel, in front of his old home, pondering the whims of Fate.  
  
Jim wasn't here. And Jim wasn't at the station, having just left there himself. He'd placed his resignation on Simon's desk. After all, it was Simon who got him into the Academy, so the formal letter would be his with a copy going to the Commander. His reasons Blair didn't go into other than to say it had been his pleasure and privilege to serve under him.   
  
The eerie silence of the station proceeded him as Blair left, feeling as if the building itself was mourning a passing friend. The only blight, the snarling desk sergeant taunting him as he walked past. Blair just clasped him on the shoulder wishing him the best as he laid his security badge in his hand. The comical expression on the sergeant's face made each ache and pain he'd suffered almost worth it.  
  
Then Blair drove to the darkened recesses of 852 Prospect, to sit and wait. How long he waited Blair had no idea. He'd long since abandoned the heater in favour of the warmth from the woollen blankets plundered from his back seat. He was so lost in thought that when sleep finally claimed him; he'd never felt the passage from waking to R.E.M.  
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When left to your own devices, how far are you willing to go to achieve your dreams? How much of yourself do you sell? How much are you willing to leave to chance, in the hands of wanton Fate?  
  
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What woke him, Blair had no idea, but one moment he was sleeping the sleep of the damned and the next he was wide awake struggling out of his cocoon and hobbling for all he was worth to the front door. 'Be there, be there, be there' became his mantra.   
  
Light spilled into the early morning sky. There wasn't much time. The buzzer sounded letting him in, and Blair hurried up the three flights as fast as his leg would let him. Figures, the elevator would be out. Jim waited at the door as Blair rounded the corner, curls flying in every direction as he skidded to a halt.  
  
"Blair?" slipped from Jim's lips in a mixture of surprise and concern. "What's wrong."  
  
Clutching his side, and trying to catch his breath, Blair limped forward. "Oh man am I glad to see you. I was afraid I'd missed you."  
  
More confused than ever, Jim stepped back holding the door open for his friend. "What happened this time?" Anger barely held in check stifled his words and further movement.  
  
"Whoa, tough guy. Enough of the Blessed Protector already. I'm fine. A few bruised ribs and a pulled muscle in my leg. I'll heal."  
  
"Then?"  
  
"I came to say good-bye." No hedging on this one. 'No regrets.'  
  
"Leaving, " Jim sat down hard on the sofa. "But I thought..." he ended helplessly. His next words nearly tore Blair apart, as disbelief set in. "You can't leave, you're my guide."   
  
Blair gone? For good? Not just out of the apartment, but out of his life? ' No...' Jim shook his head angrily. "No."  
  
"Jim," Blair gingerly sat on the coffee table, his hand resting on Jim's knee. "I'm more than your Guide, I'm your friend. And the friend can see the walking disaster I've become. You, Simon, the Department, 'me'...it's all a ticketing time bomb waiting to go off. "  
  
"Blair, just hang in there. They'll come around, just give them time." Uncertainty coated his words, as if Jim didn't believe them anymore than Blair did. He leaned forward, lightly smacking Blair on the shoulder. His hand hit sensitive, bruised and raw flesh instead.   
  
Blair hissed as he jerked back, rubbing gently at the abused skin. "I can't stay, Jim. Try to understand. This," Blair referred to his arm, "was only the beginning."  
  
"Chief?" Blair's reaction to his touch had left Jim slightly off guard. He hadn't hit the younger man that hard, yet Blair had reacted as if he'd been scalded. "What haven't you been telling me?"   
  
Concerned, Jim really looked at his friend. What he had thought was just heavy stubble at the corner of Blair's jaw, was in fact an almost faded bruise. What Jim had brushed off as fatigue after a work out at the Academy, was a man ignoring his body's response to pain. The top button on Blair's collar was open, revealing angry, oval shaped marks. His hand was moving toward bare skin before Jim even thought about it. "Blair?"  
  
"Look," Blair rose from the table half-limping, half-pacing. "There's nothing to tell. I'm a hazard and a hindrance, not only to you but to the rest of the Department."  
  
"That's bullshit and you know it." Jim's voice was even, the stress leaving as he thought he'd found the source of the problem. Blair was scared, so he was running. But Blair's next reaction surprised him. Anger leached off the young man as he began to remove his shirts. As each button on the last flannel was undone, more and more abused skin was exposed.   
  
"I'm going to put this in the simplest terms possible. I have to leave in an hour and I don't want to waste it fighting." The last button popped free. "Do you see this?" Blair struggled out of his shirt. "My legs aren't much better." Mottled skin in varying hues of blue, green, brown, and yellow met Jim's horrified gaze.  
  
"Why didn't you tell me?"  
  
"Because it doesn't matter!" Blair yelled. "You can't fight my battles for me, Jim. I had to do this for myself, and IT DOESN'T MATTER! I'm not going to be able to prove myself. I graduate in a week, top of my class, and it still doesn't matter. They don't care and I'm tired of it all. Tired of a struggle that won't mean a damn thing in the end, because either way I still lose."  
  
"Sandburg, you're not making sense." And Jim wanted this to make sense. He needed it to make sense or he was going to lose his friend for good. He had to find some way to fix things so that Blair would stay.  
  
"How many times in the last month has back up been slow in responding?"  
  
"So? Simon ranted and problem solved." Where was Blair going with all this?  
  
"You think it won't happen again? Come on, Jim. You don't believe that any more than I do. And how many fights have broken out at the station over the mere fact that I'm your partner?"  
  
"I don't care, Blair. You've earned it."  
  
"But I care, Jim. And you're right. I have earned the right to be your partner. So why am I killing myself to prove it again? Once wasn't enough? Why is everything different now? How am I different? I'm not. This charade is over."  
  
Blair was right. He'd been lying to himself. A sigh escaped as his face fell into his hands. A good idea turned horribly wrong. Blair deserved better, was owed more than Jim could ever hope to repay. "Okay."  
  
"Okay?"  
  
"Yeah, okay. Whatever you want." Jim didn't want to look up. He was too afraid of what he would see next. Hearing the hopeful yearning in Blair's voice was bad enough.  
  
"Okay."  
  
"What are you going to do?"  
  
"Eli's offered me a position on his next trip."  
  
The world began to slowly spiral out of control. "Where are you going?"  
  
"Somewhere in Argentina."  
  
Half a world away. "Blair, I don't think that's such a good idea."  
  
"Hell, neither do I, but I want to go. I need the time to think about what I am going to do for the rest of my life."  
  
But what choice did he have? "You'll write?"  
  
"Yeah, man. When ever I can."  
  
Jim finally looked up. Keeping his expression as neutral as possible, only the death grip on his legs giving him away, Jim let himself say the words he dreaded most. "When do you...leave?" Leave. Not just going home after a hard day's work, but gone. No more Blair.  
  
The light coming through the balcony doors surrounded Blair, an amalgamation of light and dark, a shadow hidden in the flame. Jim saw Blair for what he had become over the last two months, a shadow. Was that any way to live your life? He wouldn't call that living at all.   
  
Blair starting speaking again, but Jim didn't hear him. He saw the lips move but he couldn't make sense of the words. Simply stared at the man limping through the rays as if he was a ghost weighted by his chains gliding through the walls.  
  
"...and I gotta be back at Eli's by six. Yo! Jim, snap out of it."  
  
Jim shook off his morbid thoughts. "Sorry, it's just..." He rose, crossing the room in three steps to stand millimeters from his friend. This close he could scent the excitement rolling off of Blair, see the barely contained nervousness, hear his heart pounding, racing for some unknown destination.   
  
"What?" Blair fidgeted, unnerved by the intense scrutiny. Not now Jim. Not. Now. Don't do this to me.  
  
"Your hair." Letting the unvoiced plea lie in the no man's land between them, Jim fingered a curl. It wrapped around his thumb as if it had a will of its own.   
  
"My hair? This is getting weird, even for us." Blair chuckled breaking the tension.  
  
Smiling, Jim gave it a playful tug. "What I'm going to miss most about you."  
  
"Now I know you've lost it." Blair mimicked Jim on a typical morning, "Sandburg! Get your ass in here and clean out the drain!"  
  
"Okay, so I won't miss that part."  
  
"So..."  
  
"You have to go."  
  
"Yeah."  
  
Jim stepped back, giving the young man space, closing himself off at the same time. He couldn't do this without his walls firmly in place. "Later, Sandburg. Take care of yourself."  
  
"You too, man. I'll miss you." Blair stuck his hand out.  
  
"Me too." Ah, fuck it. Jim pulled Blair in for a bear hug. "Longest, best week of my life."  
  
"The best."  
  
"Get out of here before I remember you owe me rent or something."  
  
Blair walked out, a much slower pace than his panicked arrival. As if Blair didn't want to go, but would anyway, regretting every step he took further and further away. Jim lost sight of him, tracking him by sound alone. Second floor, first. Shuffling down the short hallway to the lobby door. He hurried to the balcony, wanting to draw this moment out as long as possible even though each lingering second stretched what was left of his nerve taut.   
  
As Blair exited the building, he stopped, knowing what he find. Jim was there. On the balcony. Just as he knew he would be.  
  
"Blair." His voice loud in the silence, Jim juggled something in his hand.  
  
"Yeah?" Blair started toward his car, knowing that if he didn't keep moving that he'd never leave.  
  
"Here." Silver arched through the air. Turning, Blair grabbed the object in mid flight. His keys. "Just so you remember where home is."  
  
"Oh man...Jim, you don't have to do this."  
  
"Yeah, I do..." Jim hesitated. It was now or never. Taking a deep breath, "I..." He couldn't say it. His throat closed off.  
  
"I know." His smile sardonic, Blair walked those last few steps to his car. "I've always known." He opened the door, and with one last ironic glance, got in. His hand on the ignition he spoke, Sentinel soft. "But I'm 'in love' with you. See the difference?"   
  
The car started on the first try, drowning out a shout from Jim. Blair just drove away, never once looking back. It was too late, too late, too late and deep inside a crack opened, drowning him in the vacuum.   
  
Left with nothing, Jim looked out over his city. Blindly, he watched as the sun completed its formal ascent, the streetlights blinking out one by one. Unbidden a half-forgotten memory of Incacha spilled forth from his memory...  
  
"One day, Enqueri, you shall have to chose between heaven and the stars. Chose well."  
  
By this time tomorrow he'd be on his way to work. He would sit at his desk to study a new case, chase down a lead, or maybe question a suspect. Alone.   
  
No Blair bouncing in for a few hours after the Academy. The babble of machines, detectives, and perps, overwhelming his corner of the room. Simon shouting as if it was a typical day at the office. Connor muttering to herself as she played hunt and peck with her damaged keyboard. Rafe and Brown rough housing across their desks. Situation normal.  
  
Except for the fact they were the stars.   
  
Utter silence permeated the loft as the world outside faded away and the Sentinel fell into the darkness of his own thoughts. Pale, vacant eyes bored out into the awakening city and for one split second hated.   
  
Jim didn't want stars. And now it was too late.  
  
+===+===+  
  
Funny thing about Fate, most never know the moment is upon them until it has already past.   
  
+===+===+ 

This Time Tomorrow

+===+===+  
  
His call is seductive,  
A tempting, beguiling want,  
A suffering, blinding need,  
And his scent overpoweringly sweet.  
  
There is no greater mercy,  
Nothing with which you can compare,  
Only a simple command to follow,  
When Fate calls forth His name.  
  
His voice sings to me,  
An axe hovering about my neck,  
A simple mercy offered,  
And then I awake.  
  
Into pain.  
To noise,  
To light,  
Into the void.  
  
Nothing more than a broken vessel  
Barren kindling without a flame,  
A shell mocking life,  
Pretending that it lives.  
  
And that is His promise given,  
His toast raised to oblivion,  
A vow of eternal silence,  
My inheritance finally earned.  
  
Nothing forgotten,  
Nothing left undone,  
No one to be remembered,  
And by this time tomorrow,  
  
I will be gone.  
  



End file.
